Oscarline Onwuemenyi
28 June 2017, Abuja – The Nigerian electricity grid dropped by 1,000 megawatts (MW) as generation crashed to 2,982mw in the early hours of Monday, during the Sallah festivity.
Equally, the continued poor payment for gas supply to mostly thermal Generation Companies (Gencos) has denied Nigerians access to 6,000mw available at about 17 power stations.
Operational statistics for the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) yesterday showed that the peak generation of electricity as at Sunday was 3,903mw but that sharply dropped to 2,982mw on Monday. The lowest generation for Sunday was 3,108mw as reported by the media.
Another industry statistics say 17 electricity Gencos could not generate 6,000 megawatts (MW) of power last Tuesday because they could not pay for the gas supply.
The Gencos comprising 10 conventional thermal plants and seven other plants under the National Integrated Power Projects (NIPP) only generated 2,587mw last Tuesday out of their combined available capacity of 9,084mw.
The plants had signed a gas supply capacity of 2,199 million metric standard cubic feet per day (mmscf/d) for the operation which produced just one-third of their generation capacity. For instance, the report showed that Egbin Genco which has the capacity for 1,100mw only generated 220mw and lost a huge 880mw to the poor payment.
Another 2,184mw was lost at four power plants that have not been operational in the period. Sapele Steam, Afam IV-V and Afam did not sign for Alaoji NIPP which has 504mw capacity did not sign for gas and did not also operates contract due to some constraints. The plants were not operational and therefore could not deliver 1,680mw.
